


Grounding

by Winterling42



Series: I am also a We [2]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Sense8 (TV) Fusion, Gen, Imprisonment, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-20
Updated: 2019-07-20
Packaged: 2020-07-09 02:17:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19879957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Winterling42/pseuds/Winterling42
Summary: Bren isn't Caleb, yet. But he does wake to the impossible: a brand new cluster.





	Grounding

Bren woke up with a pounding headache and a sense of impending doom. “Ach, sheisse.” His voice bounced off the empty concrete walls of the holding cell, failing to disturb the drunk snoring in the corner. Other than that, he was alone...or ought to have been. 

“Wazzat? Who’s there? Christ’s BALLSACK my HEAD.” 

Bren started up, his heart pounding. He would have heard anyone else come in, would have heard the doors unlock and lock again. But he was...looking at a different cell, somehow, much smaller and faced with raw concrete instead of industrial gray paint. The only occupant of the cell was a small woman in ill-fitting jeans and a slightly holey shirt, holding her head in one hand and staring at him. “Who the fuck are you?” she asked, and all he could do was stammer. 

He’d had a similar experience before, the first time he’d met Astrid. And the rest of their cluster, though he didn’t like thinking about them. So he knew what this was, he knew what was happening. Unfortunately, that didn’t  _ stop _ it from happening, and he ended up hyperventilating on the floor, his mind a wash of panic. 

When he eventually got himself under control, the woman was crouched next to him, rubbing one hand slowly up and down his back to remind him how to breathe. “Shh, shh,” she muttered, in time to slow heartbeats. “Just breathe.” The moment he tensed up she drew back and sat down across from him. “You okay there?” 

“Fine,” Bren said, with some effort. 

“What’s your name?” 

That one made him hesitate. He knew that somehow, statistically impossible as it should have been, that last night’s dream had been real. That an unknown woman had birthed a cluster outside of BPO’s control. And that he was part of that cluster. 

Meanwhile, the woman in jail with him was waiting, mostly patiently, for him to answer. “Uh, Caleb,” he said at last, the first thing that popped into his head. “Caleb...Widogast.” 

She nodded slowly, and ripples of quiet disbelief flowed down the bond between them, making his head throb. “You can call me Nott,” she announced, and loudly didn’t care what he thought about it. Bren made a face that wasn’t quite a smile, charmed in spite of himself. She went about inspecting his cell, which didn’t take very long. It was a ten-by-ten cube, with metal benches along the walls and one small toilet in the corner. The door was made of iron bars painted the same gray as the walls and locked with a key Bren had seen jangling from the officer’s belt as he’d walked away. 

“So, Caleb,” Nott said, peering through the bars down into a gray hallway. “Whattaya in for? Grand theft? Larceny? A little bank robbery?” 

“Petty theft,” he said, and when she glanced back he elaborated, “I was shop-lifting clothing.” 

“Ah,” Nott said, with an air of great wisdom. “They got me and my rock collection a few days ago.” 

“Days?” Bren peered around her cell in turn, much smaller and more solitary than his own. 

“Yeah, I--okay, sorry. But where  _ are _ you? How am I in two places at once? Holy SHIT my brain is going to melt out my ears, I swear to God.” It was her turn to curl up on the floor, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. 

And Bren’s turn to crouch down next to her, reaching out a hand towards her shoulder but thinking better of it. “You are not really in two different places, N--Nott?” He waited just long enough for her to nod, and went on. “You are sharing my eyes, and I can use yours. If you concentrate on one place, you will stay there. Here,” he looked around for ways to ground her, grimaced at the universal similarity of prison cells everywhere. “Concentrate on...on the wall behind you. Feel the grains, the stone. It’s dusty, right? Focus on that, and not on anything else, and that’s where you will be.” He took her hand when she reached out blindly for the wall, her eyes still squeezed shut, and placed it against the unfinished concrete. After a few moments and some deep breaths, Nott opened her eyes again and smiled at him. 

“My head’s still killing me,” she confided, “But thanks anyway.” 

“It’ll hurt for a couple of days.” Bren shrugged and moved away to sit on the floor next to her. This was far from the worst pain he’d been in. 

“You sound like you know that for sure.” Nott looked at him from underneath the heel of her hand, her dark eyes narrowed. Bren found himself staring at the floor, running his fingertips across the rough concrete. Doing what he had just told Nott to do, except he didn’t want to be anchored here with her. Did he?

“I get a lot of headaches,” he said. And she would have left it there, probably, but he continued anyway. “Did you see? Last night...the woman in the field...”

“Y-yeah. You saw it too? Did she say anything to you?”

Bren shook his head and moved on to picking at his shoelaces, pulling them a little bit tighter with each tug. “No, but I know...I know there are others, who saw her. Like you, and me.”

“How many?” 

He didn’t have to answer. He could pretend he didn’t know. “Six,” he said, quietly. He tugged again at the shoelaces. 

“Okay. And they all have headaches too?”

He nodded. 

Next to him, Nott pushed herself to her feet. She slapped the dust off the back of her jeans and stretched, wincing when she tried to shake her head. Bren looked up at her, frowning a little even as she grinned back. “Well, Caleb, whaddaya say we blow this popsicle stand?”


End file.
